Topic > solar panel

Imagine a solar-powered iPhone that recharges wirelessly just by sitting in the sun! Or a MacBook that powers itself while you work joyfully in the park, birds tweeting happily all around! Keep imagining.

Forests grow up to reach the light. So that’s exactly what scientist Anna Fontcuberta i Morral did for solar panels: transform them into vertical nano-scale filaments a thousand times smaller than a human hair.

Constellation Energy, a holding company for Baltimore Gas & Electric, said it’s investing an undisclosed sum in Astrum Solar, which will provide solar panels for around 1 million of the utility’s customers.

Solar panel micro-inverter manufacturer Enphase Energy is looking to raise $51.5 million in a funding round and has raised around $14 million of that so far, according to a recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

1366 Technologies, a company that manufactures silicon wafers that are used in solar panels, announced today that it has received a conditional commitment for a $150 million loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Energy.

Total, a French oil company, announced today that it will purchase a majority stake in solar panel manufacturer SunPower for $23.25 per share — bringing Europe’s third-largest oil company into the growing and hyper-competitive solar panel business.

So much for the not-in-my-backyard argument: California homes with solar panels installed on them sell for more than their panel-free counterparts, according to a study by the University of California at Berkeley.